The invention disclosed herein relates to a method for supplying bottles or the like to a processing machine such as a bottle washing machine which has an inlet in front of which there are a series of successively arranged transfer stations for transferring bottles in succession to the inlet, where at least one stream of bottles is supplied by means of a supply conveyor to transfer conveyor surfaces in the transfer stations and the bottles are then advanced in single file between divider members or partitions to the individual input channels of the washing machine which provide for uniform distribution of bottles going into the machine. The invention includes apparatus for carrying out the method.
The bottle moving and guiding apparatus at the inlet to a bottle washing machine is critical to good functioning of the machine. It is here that much unwanted noise and other problems occur as a result of the complexity of admitting bottles to the washing machine with even distribution. In the system for supplying bottles to the washing machine, the bottles are usually transported in parallelism on individual tracks along lines which are perpendicular to the direction in which they enter the washing machine so they must be deflected and directed to a transfer table which is operative to present the bottles to the machine inlet. The supply conveyors which supply bottles to the transfer table, which are preferably comprised of parallel conveyor belts, causes the bottles to be advanced into individual passageways established by dividers where they are acted on by means of rotating arms and are lifted and supplied to the cells of rotating bottle baskets in the bottle washing machine. To ensure that a stream of bottles corresponds to the width of the passageways or spaces between the divider members on the transfer table and also to ensure that all passageways are sufficiently loaded with bottles for being lifted by the rotating arms, some amount of pressure develops between the bottles which accumulate in front of the dividers. This high pressure due to accumulation of bottles often leads to bottle breakage and to jamming, particularly in front of the passageways or dividers which therefore must be monitored and corrected by servicing personnel.
Various solutions to the foregoing problems have been proposed.
In German Patent DE-PS 10 09 517 apparatus is described in which a transfer plate is provided between the transfer table and the bottle supply conveyor. The transfer plate oscillates in its own horizontal plane to loosen up or expand the stream of bottles. In modern cleaning machines having 40 to 50 inlet passageways, oscillating the bottles alleviates excessive pressure or interacting forces between bottles only to a limited degree. When a bottle jam up occurs, the frictional force between bottles and the transfer plate is no longer sufficient to move the bottles.
In published German application DE-OS 14 32 358 an inlet for a bottle Washing machine is known in which a plurality of controlled movable deflection flaps are arranged on the side of the advancing supply conveyor facing away from the washing machine, with the aid of which a massive low impediment transfer of bottles ought to be possible. This device functions intermittently so that there is no guarantee there will be a sufficient number of bottles heading into the washing machine. In addition, the deflectors and their drive units must be very stable mechanically in order to resist the forces that result. When the conveyor belts are too full, there can be a blockage of the deflectors.
In German Patent DE-PS 26 14 711 a bottle washing machine is described in connection with which there is a supply conveyor which advances bottles in an oblique manner with regard to the longitudinal axis of the cleaning machine. The interacting forces between bottles with this device is thereby somewhat reduced. A relatively wide saw tooth type transfer plate which is required for the oblique feed of the bottles and which creates a number of obstructive edges impedes the transfer of bottles disadvantageously. Furthermore, a relatively wide conveyor is required by means of which the accessibility to the transfer table is greatly hindered. This has a very disadvantageous effect if a bottle jam in front of the passageways or dividers needs to be freed up or if obstructions formed by fallen bottles are to be avoided.
An installation of the first mentioned type of apparatus supplying bottles is described in the document "Seitz Information", 1977. The interacting force of the bottles is reduced with this device in that the surface of the transfer table is divided into numerous accumulation zones which are individually loaded with bottles by means of conveyors. The intended reduction in the accumulation pressure or interacting forces between bottles resulting from these measures is, however, not sufficient in many cases, especially when the bottle transfer rate is very high and the bottles have large diameters.